Brett Lee has expressed his desire to see spectators at the stadiums when Australia host India for a four-match Test series later this year. He said that it would be “difficult” for cricketers without crowd.
“I really hope that when India tours Australia this year, there will be spectators allowed, but if they are not allowed, it will be difficult, when I played cricket, I used to get a lot of energy from the crowd,” Lee told Tendulkar during their interaction on the 100 MB app.
“Maybe, if there is no crowd, they can have speakers with the fake crowd in, it can be used in the India-Australia series,” he added.
Cricket Australia last month announced the schedule of the four-match Test series. It would be played at Brisbane Gabba, Adelaide Oval, Melbourne Cricket Ground and the Sydney Cricket Ground.
Gabba would host the opening match from December 3. While the second match in Adelaide from December 11 will be India’s first away Day-Night Test, the ones in Melbourne and Sydney will be the traditional Boxing Day and New Year Tests respectively.
Even though the tour has been framed as one of the most sought-after bilateral series of the year, it was not made clear by CA if fans will be allowed or it will be staged behind closed doors.
Meanwhile, Lee also spoke about the contentious decision of ICC Cricket Committee to ban the usage of saliva on ball and said that “it will be really hard” for the current bowlers to adhere to the latest guideline.
“It’s a tough call because when you have done something for your entire life, from the age of nine, we are told to apply saliva on the ball to shine it, we have grown up with this and now everyone has been told to do something otherwise, so I think it will be really hard to stop and police, it is going to take a lot of time for people to get used it as applying saliva on the ball is a habit,” he added.